While my earlier patent application referred to the invention as relating to "bulking" of spun yarns, it is feared that such terminology may be misleading or confusing, since the term "bulking" is commonly understood to relate to processing of continuous filament yarns in a manner producing crimping of the filaments or folding them back and forth on themselves and usually producing many random erratic or irregular loops in the fibers to give greater bulk per unit length to the yarn. My invention is concerned with fluid jet processing of spun yarn formed of short and medium staple fibers, rather than continuous filament yarn, and achieves a fluid teasing or fuzzing of the yarn by spreading and disarranging the fiber ends without any looping effects to produce a novel yarn having what I call a teased effect characterized by a fuzzy, hairy or fluffy appearance resembling long staple yarns of the angora, alpaca, mohair, merino and similar types. The spun yarn when fiber ends are fluid jet teased or exploded outwardly in accordance with the present invention has a volumous hairy character which, when formed into a fabric, provides a fabric with a very pleasing soft hand and fluffy teased character resembling fabrics of angora and similar long staple yarns.
Heretofore, various processes have been used in the textile industry involving subjecting yarn to high velocity fluid jets, generally created by compressed air, designed to have the capability of creating various desired yarn effects. For example, yarns have been subjected to high velocity fluid jets to produce periodic entanglements or interlacings in the yarn to produce a coherent yarn from filaments of multi-filament yarns to improve handling of the yarn in various textile operations and provide properties similar to those produced by conventional true twisting. Fluid jet devices have also been used to produce comingled crimped yarn from synthetic continuous multi-filament yarns providing periodically spaced sites of interfilament comingling providing desired yarn effects, or to provide so-called random slugs of random length and random diameter in yarn or to produce so-called novelty bulked yarns having certain desired properties or appearance.
Many prior patents have heretofore proposed a multitude of arrangements of fluid jets or an annular fluid jet orifice directed toward or encircling a yarn feed path to produce a large number of random erratic loops and whorls in the filaments of continuous multi-filament yarn to produce what has been commonly referred to as "bulking". These, however, in substantially all cases I am aware of, have been proposed for use only with continuous filament yarn, and produce a yarn having a totally different character devoid of the teased, fluffy, fuzzy, non-looped, free fiber end character of the jet teased spun yarn of my invention. Typical of these prior patents is the Breen U.S. Pat. No. 2,783,009 disclosing various fluid jet configurations for achieving bulking of continuous filament yarns. A companion Breen U.S. Pat. No. 2,869,967 mentions the use of those same jet configurations with yarn of conventional spun staple length fibers, but in both cases, the jet configurations disclosed are simply a single jet passage laterally offset from the yarn axis or are annular jet passages encircling the yarn feed path and are expressly recognized as producing a yarn which is bulked by distorting the fibers into a multitude of random erratic loops and whorls, shown in FIGS. 8 and 9 of the latter patent, yielding a yarn which has a markedly different appearance and character from my jet teased spun yarn.
An object of the present invention is the provision of a novel method employing a fluid jet apparatus designed to suck spun yarn of spun short and/or medium staple fibers into an operating zone and subject the yarn to turbulence and vortex action by high pressure fluid streams to produce novel fluid jet teasing, fuzzing or fluffing of spun yarn of single end or plural end or plied types to produce a jet teased yarn of novel character from short and medium staple spun yarn having a unique soft, fluffy, hairy appearance without any loops formed in the fiber ends.
Another object of the present invention is the provision of a novel method employing a fluid jet device for applying to spun yarns the force of jets of compressed air or the like in certain configurations and directions in air streams producing a rotating or vortex action and a turbulent action in serially arranged stations along a yarn processing path to provide a novel jet teased yarn product having a hairy or voluminous look resembling alpaca, angora and similar long staple hairy yarns.
Another object of the present invention is the provision of a novel method for subjecting spun yarns to fluid jet streams in especial arrangement providing both vortex and turbulent effects to produce a novel jet teased yarn which can be used in conjunction with winders or twisters as a continuous process and which is suitable to a wide variety of other textile processing devices.
Other objects, advantages and capabilities of the present invention will become apparent from the following detailed description, taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings illustrating preferred embodiments of the invention.